The "Cybotronix M.A.R.S. Heroes" line is produced by Hap-P-Kid Toy, a company best known for their variouse sized battery-powered walking/light-up robots. This line appears to be their first major push into the action figure market. How does this freshmen effort fare? Read on, my friends, read on.

First, a basic overview of the series. There are three factions in the line:

Troopers- armored humans

Aliens- translucent, long limbed creatures from beyond

Megabots- heavily armored droids reminiscent of the "Gundam" mechs

There are no "characters" per se, nor does there appear to be any kind of storyline allowing children to actualy use their imaginations (something sorely lacking from the toy aisles of late).

Troopers:

Red

Gray/Silver

Green

Aliens

Blue

Green

Orange

Megabots

Green

Gray/Silver

Blue

PackagingThe packaging is very professional looking with sturdy bubbles and inner trays and a glossy, double-sided backer card. The graphics are crisp and clear and there are no spelling errors present unlike alot of foreign made "cheapy" toys

Sculpt:The sculpts for the most part are fantastic, especially considering that these are "cheap" toys! The details are crisp and distinct, not "soft" or "blobby" as is usual for low-priced toys that are not made by one of the major toy manufacturers.

There are a few downsides though:

The shoulder mounted weapons on the Aliens and Megabots (except for the orange Alien's) are hollow and have no backs as evident in the pictures above.

The Troopers' and Megabots' heads are all over the place scale-wise. They are not even consistant with each other.

There tends to be alot of space between some of the body parts, especially evident in the shoulder and hip joints on the Troopers.

Paint:While minimal, the paint apps are crisp and clean with no overspray or bad masks on any of the twenty-something figures I have purchased so far!

Articulation/Construction:These figures sport an impressive 11(Troopers and Aliens)-13(Megabots only) points of articulation! All of the POAs are ball joints as the figures are made to be taken apart and customized a la "Stickfas" or "Xevoz". The figures' construction is actually very reminiscent of the "Xevoz" line with the various body parts being held together by a ball and socket system. The range of movement varies from figure to figure due to the sculpts and differing ball/socket depths but a wide variety of poses are easily achieved.

At first I assumed these figures would be very brittle due to the small, rather spindly joints, but I was very pleasantly surprised to find that they are actually quite sturdy! I accidentially dropped one of my blue Aliens off of the kitchen counter when I was getting ready to photograph him and he popped apart but did not crack or shatter!

Accessories:Each figure comes with two highly detailed, slightly oversized weapons(except for the blue Alien who only comes with one big weapon) .

The Troopers' and Megabots' weapons are almost interchangable in designs and are cast in the same silvery gray metallic-looking plastic. The weapons are very sci-fi in design and would probably look better if they were either smaller or modified to be vehicle-mounted weapons. The small pistol (center row, left) is the only realistically scaled weapon in the line (and my favorite by far).

The Alien weapons appear to be made in the same techno-organic design as their owners.They are cast in translucent plastic (as are the Aliens) and appear to be very reminiscent of the Covenant weapons from the "Halo" videogames.

Scale:This line is 1/18 scale, with a nice range of heights from one faction to another (Troopers are shortest and Aliens are tallest).As you can see in the photo above, this line will play well with just about any other 4" action figure line.

Price Point/Availability:These figures are available at you neighborhood Walgreens Pharmacy for the easy on the wallet price of $1.00 each. Go out and buy lots!

Final Opinions:The Aliens are my favorite figures in the line as they are a great sci-fi design very reminiscent of the Drej from "Titan A.E.", and like the old Hasbro Drej figures are cast in translucent plastic! I'm debating on leaving them as-is or covering the open backs of their shoulder weapons and repainting the figures in metallic paints (same color schemes as their production versions) for an armored look.

The Troopers are my least favorite figures as-is, but could quickly become much more appealing through customizing. My major beefs with them are the heads and the shoulder/hip joints. The size of the heads are not even consistant from one Trooper to another, they range from new-sculpt Joe pinhead (gray/silver) to something that should work perfectly for anyone who wants to customize the upcoming 2.5" "Sigma6" line (red, green). The shoulder and hip problem is that there is a huge, highly visible gap between the torso and the limbs that makes it hard for me to believe that there is a person inside these suits. Swap out the exposed flesh heads with something more robotic (like the green, helmeted head) and it's much more appropriate in my eyes.

The megabots major drawbacks are the hollow, backless shoulder weapons and the oversized hollow feet. A little customizing will fix these issues right up though. The head on the green Megabot is my favorite in the line and I actually plan on army building this one (his oversized "parking meter" shoulder weapons will go in the parts bin though ).

I REALLY like this line and would like to see it continue. It's not without it's faults, but it certainly cannot be beat for the pricepoint.